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On February 23rd, Music and Linguistics Major Lili Tobias ‘19 presented her paper titled, “‘All my heart, in this my singing:’ Amy Beach and the Women’s Clubs of New England,” at the American Musicology Society – New England (AMS-NE) Chapter’s winter meeting. The AMS-NE Chapter’s winter meeting invited proposals for roundtable sessions or workshops (pedagogical, performative, and/or scholarly). Successful proposals would position the author’s contribution with respect to previous scholarship, and suggests the paper’s significance for the musicological community.

The paper that Tobias presented at AMS-NE began as her senior comprehensive paper that she wrote for her music major. Under the guidance of Professors Barbara Milewski and Jon Kochavi, Tobias chose late 18th to early 19th century American composer, Amy Beach, as her research topic. “My main argument is that her music is best discussed and analyzed within the context of other music written and performed by women,” Tobias said. “This is because Beach wrote most of her music to be performed by musicians in women’s music clubs throughout New England, which is clear from her choice of instrumentation (piano and voice, mainly).”

Tobias further noted that Beach’s choice of instrumentation matches the skills of the women musicians in those music clubs. “From a theoretical perspective, too, Beach’s harmonic language matches that of other music written by women during this era,” Tobias said.

It was not a difficult choice for Tobias to research Beach’s music for her senior comprehensive paper, since Tobias enthusiastically exclaims that Beach is her favorite composer. Not only that, Tobias saw a point of intervention to previous scholarly research on Beach’s music. “I wanted to address the problems with many accounts of Beach’s music, since they often focus on her large-scale compositions,” Tobias said. “By writing about her songs, I hoped to emphasize that these small-scale works were integral to her career as a composer, specifically because they brought about social music-making within women’s music clubs.”

Tobias was grateful to have had the opportunity to share her research with the public and to be a part of this year’s AMS-NE conference. Tobias highlighted the fact that this year’s conference had so many presentations on music composed by women. Because of this, many presentations overlapped with topics that Tobias discussed in her paper, creating highly engaging conversations.

Tobias also had the opportunity to attend and support another Swarthmore student paper presentation at a different musicology conference. Recent graduate Rachel Hottle ‘18 presented her paper titled, “Influences of Bluegrass and Radiohead on Metric Complexity in the Punch Brothers,” at the 2019 Rutgers University Musicology Society (RUMS) conference. The Punch Brothers is a progressive bluegrass ensemble. In the paper, Hottle “proposes a comparative genre analysis of metric complexity in Punch Brothers, which highlights the influence of metric conventions common in bluegrass and the progressive rock style of Radiohead.”

Currently, Tobias does not have any specific plans to expand her own paper, however, she does want to do more research on the topic. Particularly, Tobias said “I would love to expand on the theoretical section, since I’m more of a theory person than a musicology person. I only got to collect data from three of Beach’s songs, so it would be great to do an entire corpus study of all her songs in order to provide better support for the main argument of the paper.”

It is easy to assume that studying dance requires dancing, and most likely performing in front of an audience. Yet that is hardly true for all students; for Tessa Chambers ’19, a Dance minor, it is about challenging yourself, exploring your body, and studying the culture and history of dance.

“The only ‘true’ dance course I’ve taken, where there is actual dancing, is Kathak,” explains Chambers. “I have also taken a pilates course and yoga multiple times…There is always more to learn in yoga, and I’m interested in the connection that it has with improving symptoms of anxiety and PTSD.”

Like many other students who study Dance at Swarthmore, Chambers did not consider herself as having any real dance experience before coming to Swarthmore. Unlike other dance minors, she did not specifically choose to minor in the subject, but realized she had enough credits to do so – a time-honored Swattie tradition.

“Professor Olivia Sabee is really the one who put the possibility of minoring in dance on my radar,” says Chambers. “I had not even considered it until she let me know last semester that I was two credits away from a minor. I’m actually fond of the fact that the minor happened semi-organically for me.”

While her “specialty” in terms of specific dance styles is yoga, most of her classes so far have focused on dance studies, rather than technique. As she explains, she has never been personally interested in performance, but prefers to focus on dance studies courses “because I enjoyed studying the cultures, histories, and politics of dance, and Olivia made me feel welcome despite not having any dance background. And all of the technique classes that I have taken were chosen because I wanted to challenge myself, and because they made me feel good in my own body.”

In a lot of ways, dance studies courses relate to Chambers’ academic and personal interests. She is a Political Science major, and has previously been very involved in the Swarthmore Indigenous Students Association. Consequently, she is especially interested in how dance reflects power dynamics and acts as a product of society and culture, topics which various courses in the Department have covered.

“Dance studies courses like Dance in Europe and North America in the 19th and 20th Centuries and Intro to Dance Studies: Bodies, Power and Resistance are spent comprehensively analyzing how dance is shaped by the given cultural, historical and political moments that those dances came out of,” says Chambers. “These connections are what drew me to dance. It’s so much more than art and aesthetics, and is definitely related to my other academic and extracurricular interests.”

Her last few words of advice are directed to students who have no background in dance, or may not have had access to formal dance studios.

“Give the Dance [Program] a shot, even if it’s just during Add/Drop. I was intimidated to enter both technique and dance studies courses at first…because I felt that it wasn’t a place for ‘people like me.’ The Dance [Program] is incredibly welcoming and warm, however, and I have never felt anything other than acceptance and encouragement from professors and instructors.”

It was the summer before his senior year of high school and Navdeep Maini ‘19 heard “How to Save a Life,” by The Fray, being played on a piano. The beautiful music moved Maini and planted a desire within him to learn the introduction of the song. Without access to a keyboard, Maini turned to his tablet, and downloaded an app called “Piano Perfect.” With a “piano” available in the palm of his hands, Maini learned to play the introduction to “How to Save a Life.” Because of that experience of playing the piano, Maini signed up for “piano lab” at the beginning of senior year of high school.

Although that moment seems like a pivotal point in Maini’s musical training, Maini jokingly says, “My musical-training truly began around third grade with the recorder, going ham on some Buns, Hot Cross Buns.” Maini is referring to the English nursery rhyme, which is also an Easter song.

When it came time for his freshman year at Swarthmore College, Maini already knew he wanted to incorporate music into his studies, declaring a minor in the subject. With jokes aside, Maini exhibits a genuine interest in music, especially when it comes for his future. “I think a part of me felt like I had to complete something (major or minor) in music because getting a music or audio related job might be kind of cool,” Maini said.

Additionally, maintaining that same drive from his pivotal moment, Maini wanted an avenue to continue playing the piano. “I had interest in wanting to learn about how composers keep their audiences’ interests during long pieces and I also had interest in performance,” Maini said.

After taking many music classes for his major, Maini highlighted his interactions with Professor James Blasina and Professor Andrew Hauze. “Their teaching styles and methods are wonderful, and it feels like they do not mind teaching you beyond the scope of a class,” Maini said. “For example, when I was in Music 2b (Reading and Making Music: The Basics of Notation), Professor Blasina introduced me to the idea of moving to the relative minor in the middle of a song.”

Furthermore, Maini attributed his Music 48 voice lessons, his time in chorus and gamelan, and discussions with other students as other crucial learning moments. “Dr. Nancy Jantsch, my voice teacher, Professor Tom Whitman of Gamelan, and Professor Joe Gregorio of Chorus are all personable in their own ways and will work with you to not only create the best sound possible, but to enjoy music.”

Maini has written some original pieces, which he calls “simple amongst this land of complexity.” During two Parrish Lunch Hour Concerts, Maini has performed some of his original pieces. As for the near future, Maini is searching for a job in the software industry, but maintains that his interest in music will remain with him. “Music seemed interesting and theory seemed cool. Should I keep exploring this interest? What if I start hating computer science in the future? Is there something I could switch to? I think these questions fueled me towards more music and not less,” Maini concluded.

On Friday, March 1, the renowned medieval music ensemble Sequentia will perform a series of Medieval Northlandic charms, riddles, and elegies at Swarthmore College. In this world-premiere performance, director, harpist, and vocalist Benjamin Bagby and his colleagues, vocalist and harpist Hanna Marti, vocalist Stef Conner, and flutist Norbert Rodenkirchen, will chant and sing these songs in Old English, Old High German, and Old Icelandic, displaying English Professor Craig Williamson’s original translations. Professor Williamson’s translations are taken from his recently published book The Complete Old English Poems, and these translations largely inspired Bagby to construct the musical lineup.

According to Professor Williamson, he and Bagby became interested in each others’ academic work on Beowulf about ten years ago. Since then, they’ve built a friendship centered on passion for medieval studies. After Professor Williamson published The Complete Old English Poems in 2017, Bagby was “overwhelmed” with its “beauty and its depth,” and, after corresponding with each other in the same year, Professor Williamson and Bagby planned this performance to showcase both Sequentia’s and Professor Williamson’s talents.

Among the pieces that Benjamin Bagby and Sequentia will perform are Old English riddles. Though Anglo-Saxon riddles are not set to music, what makes them special are their humor and sexual suggestiveness; they are the modern day equivalent of “dirty jokes”, except Old English Riddles have both a clean and “dirty” answer. In addition, the group will sing the Anglo-Saxon magic charm of Nine Herbs, a story of healing; the Old Icelandic Song of Grotti’s Milestone, the narrative of the rebellion of two slave girls against their king; Deor, the lamentation of a tribal singer rejected by his chieftain; the lament of the last survivor from Beowulf; and Wulf and Eadwacer, a mysterious lament of a woman cut off from her lover, and some of the oldest recorded songs from the German-speaking people.

Listening to Sequentia’s performance, even if one is familiar with medieval music, is still worthwhile because no two performances of the same Medieval song will ever be the same. We usually think of music based on a certain song’s melody. However, medieval songs are “based on beats,” explains Professor Williamson. “We don’t really know the tunes. Music was never really written down in any of the Anglo-Saxon and Old Germanic languages…we have to reconstruct the melody.” So, one singer might perform the same song in a completely different way than another performer. This is especially true of Benjamin Bagby who, according to Professor Williamson, takes a more “storytelling” and “acting” approach in his performances.

In fact, Professor James Blasina of the Music Program hopes that his students will be inspired by Benjamin Bagby and Sequentia’s unique performance and see “the strong links between academic study and musical performance.” Professor Blasina says that it is tempting sometimes to try to to separate “history and context” and “ what is often referred to as the ‘music itself,’” when, in reality, “there is no such thing as the ‘music itself,’ and in order to understand the music, you have to understand more than just the notes on the page.” Benjamin Bagby and Sequentia, Professor Blasina says, exemplify just that. “To have them here is pretty spectacular,” Professor Blasina says, and he along with the Music Program feels so fortunate to be able to hear them perform live and interact with them in the classrooms.

If one is not familiar with Medieval music, however, Professor Blasina says we can still “appreciate the beauty of [the music] and find it interesting” simply by “listening to the aesthetics of the sound.” He also suggests paying particular attention to the humor in the text as a way to relate to these songs that might seem out of reach for some. Professor Blasina says that in much Medieval music, there is a “very strong sense of reverence, but also a very strong sense of irreverence.” Though it may seem ironic and paradoxical, this opposition is essential in portraying the humor and Professor Blasina says “if we can find the humor in that music” and “find the same things funny…that is one way to connect to other human beings.”

Professor Williamson is also a firm believer that, even though the songs Sequentia will be performing are from centuries ago, “there are elements of [the music] that cross the bridge between cultures and between times and between genders.”

“They were human beings,” Professor Williamson says. “Maybe they lived a different kind of life than we lived, but they had lovers, they had children, they had sorrows, they had joys…there are many ways in which they are like us.” In listening to Benjamin Bagby and Sequentia’s performance, Professor Williamson hopes that the audience will be able to see “what’s shared and what’s human between two times and two people” and form a profound connection that “crosses the bridge across time.”

The event is sponsored by the Cooper Foundation and will take place on Friday, March 1, in the Lang Concert Hall at 8 p.m.

Many students might consider taking a dance class to satisfy that ominous four PE credits requirement. Some, however, go even further and develop a real passion for the subject. This has been the case for Bel Barros Guinle ‘19, who took her first-ever ballet class at Swarthmore and is now a Dance minor.

“I didn’t have any formal dancing experience before…my first real dance class was Ballet 1 with Olivia [Olivia Sabee, Assistant Professor of Dance]. But my mom danced a lot when she was younger, and she’s an artist now and makes a lot of sculptures around ballerinas,” says Barros Guinle.

Although ballet started as a simple interest, she grew increasingly interested in the department. In addition to her Neuroscience major and Pre-Med track, Barros Guinle became a dance minor, specializing in ballet (she has also taken Modern Dance). In the middle of her busy schedule, dance has become a valuable source of relaxation and freedom.

“Schoolwork can be really stressful – this is Swarthmore,” laughs Barros Guinle. “[Dance] is a good time to disconnect from schoolwork and really be in that moment…for three hours a week, I can’t think of anything else, I just focus on what I’m doing.”

Dance also ties in to her academic work – she is especially interested in the interaction between the brain and the body. As she explains,

“One of the reasons I came to appreciate dance so much is…the more I learn about the brain, how the mind and body are intrinsically connected, the more I realize dance teaches you things sitting in a classroom won’t teach you…like, it helps me to stay focused in class. I’m also interested in working with children on the autism spectrum, and how dance therapy can be a part of that.”

For Guinle, dance ties in directly to a lot of real world issues. She recalls a performance from last spring’s Choreography class, which depicted the effects of mental illness and substance abuse; this particularly resonated with her as, once she graduates, she will be starting a fellowship researching the effects of drug addiction on the brain. But first, she has an importance dance milestone coming up – her first ever public performance, as part of Chandra Moss-Thorne’s Repertory Ballet class.

“This is the first time I’m really seeing myself as a dancer,” enthuses Barros Guinle. “No one has ever seen me dance, not even my closest friends…definitely not on stage.”

Furthermore, she has a few words of advice for students who, like her, started dance in college and have had no previous experience — go ahead and take the plunge.

“I was really scared at first to call myself a dance minor, compared to people who had invested so many years in it,” says Barros Guinle, describing the “impostor syndrome” that feels so familiar to Swatties. “But Chandra and Olivia have been so motivating, so welcoming, and they have believed in me more than I have in myself, many times. The dancers in my year…have been very welcoming and never made me feel like I didn’t belong. So if you’re without experience, go for it!”

Whether it is addressing the Latinx experience through music and performance, crafting a contemporary stage performance for taiko drumming, or teaching children how to live in the world through the practice of gamelan music, Music & Dance faculty members Belle Alvarez, Professor Joe Small, and Professor Thomas Whitman are making strides in their respective involvements.

Belle Alvarez is a visiting Associate of Performance at Swarthmore College, where she also instructs Modern II. As a teaching artist, Alvarez aims to offer a joyful and healing experience that catalyzes reflection, unity, and collective transformation. In 2016, Alvarez was honored with a scholarship from the Bartol Foundation. Through the Bartol Foundation, Alvarez educates K-12 children in the award-winning Pierre Dulaine’s Dancing Classrooms and Friends Central School. “Students learn and create collaboratively, engaging the imagination, while learning foundational dance vocabulary to refine motor skills, discover movement potential, and to attain sound knowledge of the body,” Alvarez said.

Currently, Alvarez has been collaborating in performance and activism with a Philly-based artist: Ximena Violante ‘14. Violante graduated from Swarthmore College with a major in music and is now a part of a futuristic fusion band called Interminable. Interminable explores the modern diasporic experience, performing covers and originals, both in English and Spanish. “I first met Ximena at a fundraiser for an immigrant rights coalition,” Alvarez said. “We had common interest in music with roots in son jarocho and are both from Central America—she is from Mexico and I am from Honduras.”Ultimately, it was the chemistry and the shared desire for social change through art that drew Alvarez to Violante. “I wanted to collaborate because of the synergy and dynamism I felt with our respective approaches to music and dance,” Alvarez said. “We build community and tell the stories of our communities through our art.” Most recently, Alvarez performed for Interminable’s music video, Buscando Un Futuro.

Professor Joe Small is involved with two professional taiko drum ensembles during his time outside of Swarthmore College: TAIKOZ (Australia-based) and Eitetsu Fu-Un no Kai (Japan-based).

Small met TAIKOZ members in Japan at various points in 2007 and 2008, while doing an apprenticeship for the professional group, KODO. Most recently, from October 2017 to July 2018, Small began working with TAIKOZ in a more regular capacity in an extended residency. Activities included daily training, performing at various concerts, hosting taiko classes and workshops, and doing a school tour.

As for Eitetsu Fu-Un no Kai, Small came to know the group after purchasing Eitetsu Hayashi’s DVDs and CDs at a taiko drum conference. Eitetsu-san is a solo artist with a professional supporting ensemble named Fu-Un no Kai, which translates to “The Society/Gathering of Wind and Clouds.” It was not until 2006 when Professor Small would encounter Eitetsu Fu-Un no Kai at their four-day workshop during his Fulbright Fellowship in Japan. “Having already seen Eitetsu-san and the ensemble live, it was an absolutely incredible experience and I left both intrigued and in awe of their artistry and virtuosity upon the taiko,” Small said. Small became an official member of Eitetsu Fu-Un no Kai in September 2012, training, performing, and touring with them across Japan and overseas.

“In both cases, I hope to continue working, learning, and being involved in order to continue to forge my own path with taiko, and to share it with the Swarthmore College community,” Small said. “Particularly I want to follow Eitetsu-san’s approach (which TAIKOZ has made use of for their own artistic projects) to consider taiko drumming in terms of a creative contemporary art form for the stage, that receives wide influence from cultures around the world as well as from Japanese traditional folk and classical arts.”

Currently, Small is still putting together plans, especially for this coming summer. “I will be teaching at the bi-annual North American Taiko Conference in August, and it’s possible Eitetsu Hayashi and Fu-Un no Kai may have a concert in the midwest a few days later, still to be confirmed,” Small said. “I might be performing, or I might be assisting/translating, so it depends on the lineup and program.”

Professor Tom Whitman teaches Balinese Gamelan performance to local elementary school children in a program he created in 2004. Whitman initiated the program at Chester Community Charter School. Later on, he moved the program to Stetser Elementary School, staying there for about ten years. After that, for another couple of years, Whitman again coordinated the program at Chester Charter School for the Arts. As of fall of 2018, Whitman moved the program to North Philadelphia, at the William Kelly School, where he can spend more time with the children.

In the program, students learn to play gamelan instruments as a group. Gamelan refers to a traditional Indonesian ensemble of percussion instruments—mostly bronze-keyed xylophones, and some gongs and drums. “Gamelan music does not really have soloists,” Whitman said. “It is a group/community that comes together and everybody contributes an element to the overall texture.”

“So learning gamelan is also about teaching kids how to live in the world,” Whitman continued. “It is about cooperating and being polite and being able to be a productive member of a group that is really rewarding without stepping on anyone else’s toes.”

Additionally, students learn about Indonesian culture, though Whitman said, “I think a much more important piece of cultural exchange is that the kids get to meet college students. A big part of what I want to do is get little kids thinking about the possibility that college is a place where they might see themselves. Both in Chester and North Philly a lot of kids grow up in homes where it is just not something that they ever encounter.”

Without the Lang Center for Civic and Social Responsibility, Whitman would not have been able to start his program, so he is extremely grateful for their help and support. Furthermore, Whitman is always looking for more Swarthmore student volunteers to assist the program, so interested students should inquire through email (twhitma1@swarthmore.edu). As for next year, Whitman is brainstorming possible new iterations of his current program.

Hubbard Street Dance Chicago has for decades been a pioneering force in the field of contemporary dance. Since its founding in 1977, the group has consistently received rave reviews from critics for its innovative style and mastery. Originally formed with an emphasis on jazz dance under the oversight of founder Lou Conte, a choreographer and Broadway dancer, Hubbard Street took a broader approach to dance after former Nederlands Dans Theater artistic director Jim Vincent took the lead. The dance company expanded its range, drawing influence from overseas, partnering with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and cultivating more personality in their pieces through Inside/Out, a workshop which encourages dancers to choreograph their own pieces.

Their performance on Friday will feature a piece titled “There Was Nothing,” choreographed by Jon Boogz and Lil Buck, co-founders of choreography company “Movement Art Is,” in collaboration with dancer and choreographer Emma Porter. In an interview, Boogz describes his creative vision:

“It takes you on an emotional journey, and we start from the beginning: the creation of Earth. Then it goes from the creation of Earth, to Earth giving birth to man, to the final chapter, Mother Earth’s tormented relationship with humanity.”

“In the beginning of the piece, you get this appreciation of Earth, in all its wonders, in all its elements, and all the things as human beings we should appreciate about our planet. Then it goes into the chapter of relationship, and connection, and how man used to have a beautiful relationship with the planet, to then now in the final chapter, you get the disconnection: the industrialization, the buildings, the pollution, all the things negative that we’ve been doing to our planet that doesn’t serve us as human beings.”

The music of “There Was Nothing” was written by Dev Hynes, also known as Blood Orange, and will be performed live by Third Coast Percussion. Lil Buck described working with Third Coast Percussion as “some of the most amazing live performances I’ve ever seen in my life. The way they use instruments, the variety that they have from one instrument and how they can use that is incredible.”

The four members of Third Coast Percussion met in 2004 as percussionists studying at Northwestern University and as members of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, a pre-professional orchestra organized by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association. In the 15 years since then, they’ve risen to prominence as one of the leading percussion groups in the country, commissioning and debuting works from modern composers, performing live, and releasing five full-length albums and three EPs. Their album Third Coast Percussion | Steve Reich won the Grammy Award for Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance in 2017, and received an enthusiastic commendation from Steve Reich himself, who called the project ““Sensational! Sometimes people ask if my music allows interpretation. I can’t think of a better answer than to play them [this album].”

Aside from both working out of Chicago, HSDC and Third Coast Percussion also bear other striking resemblances. Both groups have covered an extensive repertoire, ranging from the classical to the contemporary. Both have toured extensively across the country and across the world. And above all, both are committed to reaching out to their communities, and put an emphasis on education and accessibility for their art. Hubbard Street holds dance classes and workshops for all levels and ages, and offers a scholarship program for aspiring professional dancers. Third Coast Percussion has been the resident ensemble at the University of Notre Dame since 2013, and maintains a variety of outreach programs, including educational performances, lectures, and premiering the work of emerging composers. On Wednesday, February 6th, Third Coast Percussion will give a lecture in Lang Concert Hall on “The Science of Sound,” and on Thursday, HSDC will host a ballet master class and a dance workshop.

Assistant professor of dance Olivia Sabee says “it is really important to the educational mission of the College for students and community members to have access to experiences like these in conjunction with [Hubbard Street and Third Coast]’s performances, so I am excited for students to attend these workshops as well as the performance events.”

Third Coast Percussion’s time at Swarthmore will conclude with a performance of Terry Riley’s groundbreaking In C, a piece which arguably sparked the American minimalist music movement. Students, faculty and staff of the college, as well as area residents, will all come together to play in Lang Concert Hall alongside the members of the group.

Andrew Hauze ‘04, one of the coordinators of the project, describes how “Third Coast Percussion has an amazing list of educational and community programs that they offer, and we jumped at the chance to have a community play-in of Terry Riley’s seminal minimalist work In C. The construction of the work offers new opportunities for musicians from so many different musical backgrounds to perform together and to develop new ways of listening.”

In C, composed in 1964, consists of 53 phrases of music of varying length, without a specified instrumentation and only a loosely designated order. Beginning with a single rhythmic eighth note pattern on the note C, instruments gradually accumulate, forming a swell of polyphonic sound that can last anywhere from 20 minutes to over an hour. As such, no two performances of In C are the same.

Hauze continues, “We are thrilled to have Third Coast Percussion on campus thanks to the funding of the Cooper Foundation. As a Department of Music and Dance, we are so excited that we are able to bring their collaborative work with Hubbard Street Dance to campus as a model of creative work between two leading companies in dance and music. I’m particularly looking forward to having students, faculty, staff, family members, and community members join together led by such an amazing quartet of musicians!”